Malware

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Cupid Fires Arrow at OpenSSL’s Heart

As if the discovery of the Heartbleed flaw weren't enough woe for OpenSSL, more than half a dozen additional defects have been discovered in the code used to protect communication on the Web. Among them is one dubbed "Cupid" by its discoverers. The flaw can be used to compromise enterprise networks....

A worldwide operation led by the United States involving law enforcement, private sector cybersecurity firms and software vendors has disrupted the GameOver Zeus botnet for now. The U.S. also has filed criminal charges in Pittsburgh, Penn., and Omaha, Neb., against Russian national Evgeniy Mikhail...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Spammers Quick to Exploit eBay Breach

If you're a spammer, big news like the recent breach of eBay's computers is like striking oil in your back yard. Perpetrators of unwanted email live for headline-grabbing events that they can use to separate gullible Web wanderers from their money, so the eBay breach is a perfect vehicle for the sca...

Apple on Tuesday aimed to calm anxiety among its iCloud users with reassurances that the service hadn't been breached in a ransomware-style attack. "Apple takes security very seriously and iCloud was not compromised during this incident," reads a company statement. The referenced "incident" is a col...

Cisco has been accused of being in bed with U.S. cyberspying efforts, according to a Chinese state media outlet. Cisco "carries on intimately" with U.S. spying apparatuses, the outlet claims, and plays "a disgraceful role" in efforts to prop up U.S. power over the Web. Cisco denied the accusations.

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Ransomware Gang Targets Android Phones

The Reveton Gang is at it again. This time, though, they're targeting users of Android phones -- typically visitors to porn sites. The gang that pioneered the idea of locking up a target's computer and demanding a ransom to unlock it has turned its attention to the rapidly growing mobile market. Onc...

Smarting from speculation that the U.S. intelligence community hoarded knowledge about the Heartbleed bug that's placed millions of servers and devices that access the Internet at risk, the White House Tuesday gave the public some insight into how it decides to release information about vulnerabilit...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Banking Trojan Enters Mobiles via Facebook

Purveyors of a notorious mobile banking Trojan have started targeting Facebook users to infect Android smartphones. The Net predators use a desktop Trojan to leverage a Facebook socializer to install banking malware on their phone, ESET malware researcher Jean-Ian Boutin discovered last week. The de...

Money will be the biggest problem users of Windows XP will face when Microsoft officially stops supporting it on Tuesday. As a last resort, Microsoft is offering custom support for Windows XP as a temporary stopgap. That could cost as much as $200 per PC per year, Gartner estimated. The UK governmen...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Americans Distrust Tech Companies

The steady stream of reports on government surveillance of Americans has taken a toll on the image of high-tech companies, according to a Harris poll. More than two-thirds of Americans -- 67 percent -- feel technology companies violate their users' trust by helping the government spy on its citizens...

Yahoo has announced a new effort to upgrade its security, in the wake of a torrent of breaches and hacker attacks over recent months. Yahoo's plans include encryption of data in motion, enabling HTTPS encryption, and implementing the latest in security best practices, said Chief Information Security...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Clock Counting Down on Windows XP Support

As Microsoft prepares to cut off support for Windows XP, hackers are sharpening their knives in anticipation of carving up the operating system's carcass. Web predators will pounce on XP 10 minutes after Microsoft pulls the support plug on the software, predicted one former military computer special...

The National Security Agency reportedly possesses a system that enables it to record telephone calls -- all telephone calls -- in a foreign country, and review conversations for up to a month after they took place. The system is said to be akin to a time machine, allowing for retroactive snooping on...

The latest Snowden revelations about NSA surveillance activities indicate the agency could infect millons of computers with malware, and has spoofed Facebook servers to capture traffic from targets. Documents previously leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden include detailed descriptions of its ...

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY

Bad Ads Outstrip Porn as Mobile Phone Infection Vectors

Trawling porn sites used to be the best way to pick up an electronically transmitted disease on your smartphone. That's changed. Every one in five times a mobile user is redirected to a malware site online, it's done through a malicious ad, according to a new report. That's three times what it was t...

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